John W. James

Where were you when I needed you?

The saddest question we ever hear is, "Where were you when I needed you?"

That's what people ask when they find out what we do in helping grievers. We're presenting helpful and accurate information on this site, at the time you need it most, with the hope that you'll never need to ask that question.

It's an honor and a sad privilege to be addressing you, knowing that each of you has recently experienced the death of someone important to you. We also know some of you are reading this because of your care and concern for someone who is confronted by the death of someone important in their life.

We bring our personal experience in dealing with the deaths of people who were important to us, and our professional know-how in helping grievers for more than 30 years. We'll help you distinguish between the "raw grief" that is your normal and natural reaction to the death, and the equally normal "unresolved grief" that relates to the unfinished emotions that are part of the physical ending of all relationships.

A basic reality for most grieving people is difficulty concentrating or focusing. With that in mind, we asked Tributes.com to print our articles in a large type font to make them easier to read. Sharing our concern for grieving people, they agreed.

Ask The Grief Experts

Many people get robbed of a funeral and the chance to say "goodbye." Published (6-19-2012)

Q:

How do I deal with the fact that my sister waited to let me know that my niece had died two weeks ago and they had the funeral the week before. I didn't get to say good-bye.

A Grief Expert Replies:

Dear Deborah,

This is a tough one.

We’d have to guess that part of the problem is that there may be an ongoing issue between you and your sister. Or that the two of you are not very close at all.

Otherwise we can’t imagine why she didn’t tell you.

On the other hand, your feeling of not having been able to say goodbye to your niece, indicates that you had a good relationship with her.

Regardless of the reasons, we can’t turn the clock back and re-visit the funeral. [However, you might want to find out if anyone video-taped the memorial or funeral.]

One thing you can do, is have your own memorial service. Hopefully you might find some other family members who’d want to spend some time sharing memories and stories of your niece.

At the end of that occasion, you could say goodbye to a picture of her.

While we don’t want to make comparisons, we can tell you that many people get robbed of a funeral with the body of the person who died, as in the cases of airplanes that go down in the sea, or like 9/11.